Sunday, January 22, 2006

The Schizophrenia of Emily Rose

We watched the Exorcism of Emily Rose last night. The best character of the whole movie was the prosecuting attorney. Man, did he put forth some awesome arguments against all the defendant's mythological mumbo jumbo. He was supposed to be a "man of faith" but he sure did talk like he was an Atheist. He had to be the most logical Christian I had ever seen!

For example, the priest found her use of numerous different languages in her "scary" growl voice to be evidence of possession. The prosecuting attorney, however, did some research and found that she had studied all the languages she allegedly "couldn't possibly have known!" And as far as hearing two different vocalizations at once, well, he pointed out that all humans have two separate sets of vocal chords and that Buddhist monks learn how to use them both in their rituals.

We had our own questions, too. I pointed out to my wife that you always hear the allegedly possessed using Latin. Why could this possibly be? Hmmm, well, could it be that because the mass, for so long, was preached only in this dead language and therefore acquired the connotation of being "holy?" Would it click so well inside the mind of the believer if she started talking in, say, the African click language? And what of the drug, Gambutrol? One of the "experts" for the defendant was this woman who thought the drug kept her locked in the possession and ultimately led to her death. She had no experience with the drug, however, and really knew nothing about it. And, most telling of all, why was it even relevant to her death? The priest told her to stop taking it! And of the miraculous coincidence that she found a locket on the ground that matched her initials? Improbable, but not impossible. Somewhere some woman was missing her gold locket and wondering if she lost it or if someone stole it. It was just her misfortune that she happened to have the same initials as the woman who found it. Otherwise, perhaps she would have thought about trying to find the owner. We also thought about how funny it would have been had the owner been an Atheist and the initials been "EAC!" Wow, my name is Emily Amy Connoly! Huh, I was just trying to support my local Evil Atheist Conspiracy! lol...

It was so obvious that she had schizophrenia -- and the archaic priest told her to stop taking her medicine! Don't want any of that evil science polluting her, now do we? They might as well have burned her at the stake. Her post mortem pics weren't that far off.

What did she die of? The autopsy revealed malnutrition related disorders. All her organs just shut down. She was so sick in the head that she thought the demons wouldn't let her eat. So she didn't. She, in the end, wouldn't drink, either. It's no wonder she was hallucinating so wildly! You take schizophrenia, add the diagnosis of epilepsy, toss in lack of food and water (known to alter your mental state) and the end result is sadly predictable.

And, as is the trend these days, the attorney for the priest started out "Agnostic" (read: Atheist) and then, within days of exposure to the priests mythology she started getting all scared. Typical Christian scare tactics. If we can't win you with the rewards end of the deal, then we'll scare the shit out of you with the punishment. Rewards & Punishment: It's the Monotheistic Way!

She just kept circling around whether or not it was possible. That was the totally wrong direction. Who cares if it's possible? It was possible that everyone in the courtroom was actually trapped in The Matrix. It was possible that she was really an alien from Saturn. It was also possible that she was having sex with the priest and that the good Father also beat and raped the girl, but none of that was mentioned. No, all that was mentioned in the realm of possibility was the existence of the supernatural. Sure, it's possible that any of the world's 10,000 distinct religion's afterlives and related characters are real (though they only focused on a very scant one), but the question that she should have been asking herself was whether or not it was probable.

1 Comments:

I just finished watching the "Exorcism of Emily Rose" and I was shocked! Not because the movie convinced me that dark age Catholic teachings are something more than imaginary. I was shocked because of the Rose family's unforgivable neglect to their daughter. This movie should have been titled "The Execution of Emily Rose." #1- This movie had the typical Hollywood agnostic/atheist. By that I mean that if you are trying to present something imaginary to an audience so that it looks credible, then you must convince the skeptics. Since the movie cannot force a real skeptic in the audience to be convinced, it must act out the skeptics conversion. This sort of atheist/agnostic is "set up" for the easy conversion, just like Kevin Bacon's atheistic character in the movie Flat Liners, their characters "know deep down inside" that God, Devils, Angels, boogey men, goblins, and elves exist, they just hide it or deny it. This is meant to get the audiences attention that not believing the the imaginary circumstance is bad. These Hollywood atheist/agnostics are typically portrayed as thieving, lying (especially to them selves), hateful, misleading, un-intelligent, and any other negative characteristic that can be attached to them. The agnostic in this movie is portrayed as an money hungry, fame loving, adulteress who helps mass murderers escape their due justice. At the end of the movie, she openly admits that the imaginary circumstances could be possible (as if any other contrary imaginary circumstance is impossible, but that would bog down the emotive force of the movie's climax). She also has a "change of heart" and decides that it is best to risk her job, and ultimately quit her law firm, to protect this priest from going to jail. This is meant to appear for the viewer that this crooked lawyer, who helped a mass murderer go free, was now doing her profession for truthful justice. But this is only Justice according to those who evangelize the imaginary way, not to actual, factual reality. True justice would demand that not only the priest be held accountable for neglect, but Emily's parents as well.#2- Emily's parents! They didn't put her into an asylum?! They sat back and allowed a priest to do who knows what to her as they watched?! They sat back and allowed their daughter to slowly die from hunger and dehydration, yet something tells me that these same parents would have insisted that Terri Shiavo's husband should be given the death penalty for removing his vegetated wife's feeding tube. But, even though all of this is evident throughout the movie, her parents are made to look like the victims! The director wants us to feel sorry for those neglectful parents. I don't! I want justice for Emily Rose! I want her parents in jail for neglect!